Market Description is different than describing your industry. It is a way to get to know your audience. Email Article Print Article Bookmark RSS Related Content:   Artist Finances   How to Sell Your Art Online   Quit Job for Art?   Create Your Blog

Market Description
Market Description is different than describing your industry. It is a way to get to know your audience. First you need to describe your market. If you’ve done your work on industry research, you have a head start here and have probably already gathered this information or can easily find it. What’s your market like? For example, if you’re a poet, what type of people read and buy poetry. How much is sold in a given year? What’s the biggest seller? Why is this the biggest seller?

Customer Profile
What is the average customer for your art like? What are their interests? What is their personality type, their career demographic, income, habits? Get to know your customer. Every art has a customer, someone who buys or participates in your art. Who are these people and what are they like?

Competition
What is your competition? Who is doing what you want to do? How, where, and why do they do it? Who supports them? How did they get to where they are? How many people are doing it and how competitive is the industry? How are they different from you? How are they the same?

Risk
What are the risks involved in doing your art? Is it highly competitive? Is it a demoralizing industry? Is there a lot of rejection? Is there little cash? Does it take up a great amount of time? Does your art take away from other endeavors? Your family and friends? What are the risks of engaging in your art? What are the risks of not engaging in your art?

Market Analysis
Market Analysis is a summation of what you’ve learned about your industry and your market. It lets you know what you can expect. It keeps your feet grounded so that when you don’t make it into that art show, you can roll with the punch and keep going instead of abandoning your art for a year and spending months of therapy and hardship to get going again. This is where you write your prediction about the market. "It’s highly competitive. The success rate to do what I do is about 10%. In addition, the travel time involved makes it hard on families and the monetary rewards are little. However, I have an advantage in that my family likes to travel, I have time to compete, my art is different from the competition because it uses XYZ in a new way. Furthermore, the emotional risks of not pursuing this venture will be severe in contrast to the risk of pursuing it."

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